Settling in.

Getting used to being here after a few days now. We're working at the Indonesian National Statistical Office. Our supervisor is really sweet but with the staff, in general, the language barrier is more difficult than I anticipated. People speak enough English for us to make some small talk, but as far as trying to understand the structure of the organization and what people's roles are and communicate about work, it is a challenge. I'm trying to learn some Bahasa as fast as I can! (Selamat pagi! = Good morning!) We're trying to identify projects that will be both useful to the organization and good learning experiences for us--so far it looks like we might develop a plan for new content to add to the website and/or design graphing tutorials since they tend to use very few visualizations of their data. I'm sure we'll come up with some good projects, it's just taking some time to get started with good ideas. Other than work, our main excursions have been to restaurants. Indonesian food is typically rice or noodles, with meat and/or veggies, fairly similar to other types of Asian food. We've tried out quite a few good places--a really fancy Indonesian one that looked like a museum with all the cool decorations, a Malaysian place with many Indian-inspired dishes, and a delicious Turkish place just last night with Jess and Will (our new English friends). I'm eating so globally! Jakarta really does have a lot of neat and interesting places to go, I think the biggest adjustment for me is just that I have to take a cab everywhere and always have a destination in mind. I can't just stroll around and find places, but I'll get used to it. Last night, after outspending our budgets at the Turkish place, we decided to save some money by buying beer at a convenience store. We found a Circle K and it happened to have a table and chairs, so we ended up having a great time drinking and playing cards at the Circle K! Who would've thought? After that, we went to a club, which did not disappoint. It reminded me of the clubs in Vegas--it was huge with 4 rooms, each with different music. The DJ's were really good and when it was closing at 4am, I was not ready to leave! Good times. Besides working and eating, I've also been quite enjoying the hotel pool. It's so nice to be somewhere with weather for swimming outside! Think I'll head out there in a bit with a book. I fear I will get too used to this life :)